Portable telephones and PHS terminals, which have become very popular devices, are widely used today.
Paralleling the employment of such devices, practical use is being made of a service whereby the location of a mobile terminal, such as a portable telephone or a PHS terminal, can be derived from information acquired for a base station communication area where the mobile terminal is located. A method where individual terminal attributes, stored in a database, can be used to select a communication terminal is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. Hei 10-326241, No. Hei 8-256142, No. Hei 10-322397 and No. Hei 9-91358. Furthermore, a method for measuring the strength and phase of signals exchanged by three base stations and a mobile terminal for use in specifying the location of the mobile terminal is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. Hei 10-234071.
However, when the only correspondence is that between a communication area and the location of a mobile terminal, it is not always possible to designate a specific location and to select a communication designation. When, for example, railway stations B and C are included in communication area A and a communication destination is to be selected as a “mobile terminal in communication area A,” those mobile terminals not only near station B but also near station C are selected as communication destinations while a mobile terminal near station B cannot be selected.
Likewise, when railway station D is included in both communication areas E and F, and a terminal near station D is to be selected as a communication designation, mobile terminals that communicate with base stations in communication areas E and F are selected, but a mobile terminal near station D that communicates only with a base station in communication area F cannot be selected. Even if a communication area wherein a mobile station is present is added to a database for the selection of a mobile terminal for communication, the above problems are not resolved.
In addition, conventionally, to select a communication terminal, the communication area for a communication destination and a time zone cannot be designated based on the detected location of a single mobile terminal, or the attributes (hobbies, age, etc.) of a recipient cannot be designated.
Therefore, one object of the present invention is to provide a mobile communication system for designating a specific location and for selecting a call destination and a method therefore.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a mobile communication system and a method for designating a specific location, a time zone and an attribute to select a call destination.